(1) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image processing apparatus and a management apparatus that are connected to a client terminal, and in particular to a technique for determining a schedule for executing image processing jobs and firmware rewriting jobs in the image processing apparatus.
(2) Related Art
Conventionally, when there is a need to change programs or control parameters for controlling operations of an image forming apparatus such as a printer, the mask ROM on the control circuit board in the image forming apparatus is exchanged for a mask ROM in which new firmware is written. However, it is necessary to send a service person out to exchange the mask ROM. This is costly since exchanging the mask ROMs is complicated and takes considerable effort.
For this reason, systems have be conceived in which a rewritable flash ROM is used instead of mask ROM, firmware for rewriting is distributed via the Internet, and the image forming apparatus automatically executes firmware rewriting. Japanese laid open patent application 2000-162926 discloses one example of such a system. In this system firmware for a facsimile apparatus is attached to e-mail and transmitted to the apparatus. This enables a great reduction in the cost of firmware rewriting.
However, as apparatuses become highly functional and multi-functional, firmware for image processing apparatuses has swelled in size to be around 10 megabytes, and is tending towards further increase in the future. Due to cost demands, the structure of the internal control unit in an image processing apparatus is not optimized for completing the firmware rewriting quickly, since the firmware in an image processing apparatus is not rewritten often. Generally a low speed serial interface originally for the purpose of transmitting and receiving control data is used when writing firmware to storage devices such as the flash ROM. For this reason, processing for rewriting such large firmware takes several tens of minutes.
Furthermore, while the firmware of a control module that executes print control is being rewritten, print control cannot be executed, and therefore print jobs are not executed during this time. Of course, if a redundant structure is employed in the control unit of the image forming apparatus such as that disclosed in Japanese laid open patent application 11-7382, it is possible to rewrite the firmware without stopping print operations. However, this kind of redundant structure is generally not feasible because of restrictions in cost of the image forming apparatus.
Consequently, in a conventional image forming apparatus, print jobs and firmware rewriting jobs are managed so that the jobs are executed in the order in which they are received by the image forming apparatus.
However, in such a firmware rewriting system the service center distributes firmware attached to e-mail regardless of the reception state of print jobs in the image forming apparatus. Having jobs executed in order of reception as described above can cause, for example, the following types of inconveniences.
1. When a new print job is received after reception of a firmware rewriting job, the print job is not executed until the firmware rewriting has ended. Considering that the time required to rewrite the firmware as described above may be several tens of minutes, this causes inconvenience for the user who has to wait for several tens of minutes, and also hinders smooth paperwork.
2. On the other hand, there are cases in which it is desirable to execute firmware rewriting processing urgently in order to avoid breakdowns and malfunctions in the image forming apparatus. In such cases, there is a danger that waiting until after all print jobs that were received before the firmware rewriting job have ended to execute rewriting processing may result in print defects such as deterioration of printed image quality, or jams.
3. Furthermore, having the execution schedule of jobs determined at the discretion of the image processing apparatus can be contrary to the wishes of the user.
Such problems in a firmware rewriting system occur not only in image forming apparatuses such as printers and photocopiers, but also in scanners or in image data processing apparatuses (hereinafter apparatuses that are involved in some way with processing image data are referred to under a broader term “image processing apparatuses”).